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גֹּב

AramaicH1358“den”

Appears 10 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Dan 6:7(8)Dan 6:12(13)Dan 6:16(17)Dan 6:17(18)Dan 6:19(20)Dan 6:20(21)Dan 6:23(24) (2×)Dan 6:24(25) (2×)
Word studyGOHVnoun

What gov means

a pit for lions: a hole sunk in the ground with an opening at the top, into which a condemned person was thrown

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

This word turns up in only one chapter of the Bible, Daniel 6, and it always names the same thing: the place King Darius kept lions. English Bibles print it "den", and the picture most readers carry is a cave mouth with bars across it. The chapter itself describes something else.

Every detail the story gives fits a hole sunk into the ground rather than a cage or a cave:

  • Daniel is thrown down into it rather than led inside (Daniel 6:16)
  • a single stone is laid across its mouth and sealed with the king's ring (Daniel 6:17)
  • the king cries out to Daniel as he comes up to it at first light (Daniel 6:20)
  • Daniel is lifted back up out of it once the king arrives (Daniel 6:23)
  • the men thrown in afterward are seized by the lions before they reach its floor (Daniel 6:24)

The word also does double duty in the chapter. In the officials' decree it is a sentence rather than a place: anyone who asks anything of any god or man except the king is to be thrown into the den of lions (Daniel 6:7, quoted back to the king in Daniel 6:12). Used that way, the phrase works in Aramaic the way "the gallows" once worked in English, naming a punishment by naming where it is carried out. Only later does the same word name the actual hole the king runs to at dawn.

The related Hebrew word (גֵּב) covers dug hollows of any kind, the ditches an army cuts across a valley or a village cistern gone dry. The Aramaic word keeps that basic idea, a hollow cut into the earth, and fastens it to one particular pit that no other part of the Bible mentions.

Dan 6:7(8)Dan 6:12(13)Dan 6:16(17)Dan 6:17(18)Dan 6:19(20)Dan 6:20(21)Dan 6:23(24) (2×)Dan 6:24(25) (2×)

What scholars say about gov

All ten occurrences stand in Daniel 6 (English versification 6:7, 6:12, 6:16, 6:17, 6:19, 6:20, 6:23 twice, 6:24 twice), and the lexica are uniform: HALOT and BDB both give Biblical Aramaic גֹּב as "pit, den", connecting it with a root meaning to dig or hollow out, the same root behind Hebrew גֵּב "cistern, ditch". Three occurrences are bound directly to אַרְיָוָתָא "the lions" (6:7, 6:12, 6:24); the remaining seven carry the Aramaic definite ending גֻּבָּא and stand either alone or with the relative particle דִּי before "the lions". The Greek versions of Daniel, both the Old Greek and Theodotion, render the noun λάκκος "cistern, pit", which supports the subterranean picture, as does the narrative's own vocabulary: פֻּם גֻּבָּא "the mouth of the pit" closed by a single stone and sealed (6:17), רְמָה "throw" for entry against הַנְסָקָה "bring up" for release (6:16, 6:23), and אַרְעִית גֻּבָּא "the floor of the pit" (6:24). Collins and Newsom handle the den in their commentaries on the chapter without questioning the lexical sense; the discussion there concerns the episode's historical setting and its folkloric shape, not what the noun denotes. The standard literature records no disagreement about the word's meaning.

Sources

  • HALOT, s.v. גֹּב (Biblical Aramaic)lexicon
  • BDB, Biblical Aramaic lexicon, s.v. גֹּבlexicon
  • John J. Collins, Daniel (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), on Daniel 6commentary
  • Carol A. Newsom, Daniel: A Commentary (OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014), on Daniel 6commentary
  • Franz Rosenthal, A Grammar of Biblical Aramaic (7th ed.; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2006), glossarygrammar

AI-generated word study · claude-opus-4-8

All attested forms of גֹּב

c s determined

גֻּבָּא

Dan 6:16, Dan 6:17, Dan 6:19, Dan 6:20, Dan 6:23, Dan 6:23, Dan 6:24

c s construct

גֹב, לְגוֹב

Dan 6:7, Dan 6:24, Dan 6:12